


Aziraphale's New Year's Day

by burnttongueontea, fenrislorsrai



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Just William - Richmal Crompton
Genre: A leetle bit of crack, Angel and Demon True Forms (Good Omens), Art, Aziraphale is "just enough of a bastard to be worth knowing" (Good Omens), Aziraphale's Bookshop (Good Omens), Aziraphale's True Form (Good Omens), Comedy, Fluff, Gen, Historical, Humor, New Year's Resolutions, Sculpture, this really is just a bit of fun based on a story i used to love as a kid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-18
Updated: 2020-12-07
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:36:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25355614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burnttongueontea/pseuds/burnttongueontea, https://archiveofourown.org/users/fenrislorsrai/pseuds/fenrislorsrai
Summary: You may already know that Adam Young is based on William Brown, the mischief-making protagonist from Richmal Crompton’s famousJust Williamstories. What you may not know is that one ofGood Omens’s other main characters, Aziraphale, is also functionally indistinguishable from this naughty eleven-year-old boy.In aGood Omensretelling of a classic William story, join Aziraphale at the beginning of 1800, as he finally fulfils his dream of owning a bookshop... by stealing someone else’s for the day. (Or, in his preferred words, by helpfully taking charge of one without prior consent.)Aziraphale will find himself taking to shopkeeping like a duck to water (where the water is a shallow pond, and the duck was asked to make a bit of a mess in it.) But how will the real owner react when he returns to discover an unauthorised customer has been running his business all day?Illustrated
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale (Good Omens)/Books
Comments: 8
Kudos: 20
Collections: Good Omens Mini Bang





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A fic written for the Do It With Style Mini Bang event, summer 2020.
> 
> Text by burnttongueontea (with apologies to Richmal Crompton), art by fenrislorsrai.
> 
> Huge thank you to the DIWS mods for running a wonderful event, and to [doomed_spectacles](https://archiveofourown.org/users/doomed_spectacles) for the beta-read!
> 
> (Readers are requested to forget the line in the 1793 scene where Aziraphale has already had the idea of opening a bookshop, because it's not convenient to me.)
> 
> (Familiarity with the original William story is not required, but it can be found online [here](https://americanliterature.com/author/richmal-crompton/short-story/williams-new-years-day).)

Aziraphale went humming down the street, occasionally popping a walnut in his mouth as he went. His hum was enthusiastic rather than melodious. Unsavoury persons tended to (very mistakenly) single him out as a potential target for pickpocketing when they heard it. The proprietor of the Moss & Co bookshop, however, was not an unsavoury person. He nodded affably as Aziraphale passed. ‘Mr. Fell’ was a regular customer of his – as regular, that is, as the wholly inadequate shelving in the angel’s lodgings would permit.

Encouraged, Aziraphale paused at the doorway and ceased to hum.

‘Hello, Mr. Moss!’ he said.

‘Hullo, Mr. Fell,’ said Mr. Moss.

‘Any news on that Goethe translation I asked you about?’

Mr. Moss shook his head.

‘I’ve still only got the German.’

The angel sighed.

‘That’s a terrible shame,’ he said.

‘What isn’t a shame? Tell me that. What isn’t a shame?’ said Mr. Moss lugubriously.

‘You wouldn’t even procure one copy of the English, if I paid you in advance for it?’

‘My shop, my stock. You know the rules of the game. I thought you spoke German, anyway.’

‘Oh, yes, quite well. The translator is an interesting fellow, that’s all,’ explained Mr. Fell. ‘Mr. Walter Scott.’

He looked off into the distance for a moment, probably thinking wistfully about that promising young Scott. Mr. Moss, who had recently been having somewhat delicate discussions with his creditors, studied his crestfallen customer.

‘Tell you what,’ he said. ‘Today’s the thirty-first, isn’t it? I’ll do it. Order you a copy, special, for advance payment. As a New Year’s gift.’

Mr. Fell brightened. Not quite so much that he forgot how to negotiate. After a few minutes of discussion conducted in perfectly courteous tones, an agreement as to price and commission was reached, with each party’s feathers only slightly ruffled by the haggling.

‘And what good resolution are you going to take tomorrow?’ went on Mr. Moss, slipping the angel’s cash into his pocket.

Mr. Fell considered this in silence for a moment.

‘Good resolution?’ he repeated, frowning. ‘I suppose I don’t have one.’

‘You’ve got to have a good resolution for New Year’s Day,’ said Mr. Moss firmly.

‘I do? Is that some sort of tradition, now? Like… cleansing sins with a hundred and eight bell-rings, or denying entry to a singing horse-skull?’

‘Er… yes. Something like that. You’ve got to think of some fault of yours you’d like to cure and start tomorrow.’

Mr. Fell pondered. Angels, of course, did not have faults. Not that he couldn’t reproach someone like Gabriel for one or two… and as for Aziraphale himself, _well_ … but the point was, there were things you discussed with humans, and things you didn’t. Then again, Mr. Moss seemed very keen for him to cure _something_ , and he really ought to learn about this new human custom.

‘I can’t think of anything,’ he said at last. ‘You think of something for me.’

‘You could resolve to spend less time in my bookshop,’ Mr. Moss suggested.

‘No,’ said Mr. Fell, shaking his head, ‘that wouldn’t be much fun, would it?’

Mr. Moss, already thinking again about his creditors and feeling he had spoken somewhat rashly, was inclined to agree.

‘Or… to swear off treats and sweet things?’

This did not seem any more appealing to Mr. Fell than the previous suggestion.

‘I suppose I could try to stop using miracles to keep my coffee warm,’ he mused, to himself.

Mr. Moss, who had become used to disregarding this sort of cryptic statement from his customer, continued:

‘Doesn’t have to be giving something up, you know. My old auntie always says she’s going to be kinder to the unfortunate. And my brother, last year, _he_ resolved to make peace with an old enemy of his.’

Mr. Fell’s face lit up. ‘Aha!’ he said. ‘Now, _that’s_ a good idea. I think I could manage that. Tell me, how long does this “resolution” business usually go on for?’

‘Most people give them up after the first day, really.’

‘I see. And what is yours?’

Mr. Moss looked round his little shop with the air of a conspirator, then leant forward confidentially.

‘I’m going to ask her again,’ he said.

‘Who?’ said Mr. Fell, mystified.

‘Someone I’ve asked regular every New Year’s Day for ten years.’

‘Asked what?’

‘Asked to take me, of course.’

‘Take you where? Why can’t you go yourself?’

‘To marry me, I mean,’ said Mr. Moss, blushing slightly as he spoke.

‘Goodness,’ said Mr. Fell. ‘For ten years? _Really_? Does she _know_ you’ve got a bookshop?’

The next morning, the door to Crowley’s large, sumptuously-furnished apartment was firmly locked. Aziraphale knocked and waited twice, but nobody answered. So, he miracled it open and carried his peace offering straight through to the bedroom, where a human-shaped form could just about be discerned beneath the absurd quantity of satin pillows piled up across the four-poster bed.

‘Happy new century!’ the angel trilled, opening the shutters with another miracle.

‘Mmmrmrmrrrrrrgghhhh,’ said Crowley, who had not held back in celebrating the passing of the last one. ‘No. Go away.’

‘But it’s 1800 today! You must be a _bit_ excited. At least. I think it’s going to be a good one.’

‘Saying it again, angel. No.’

‘No to which bit?’

‘All of it.’

Somewhere in the middle of the bed, a hand emerged, and shifted the location of a few cushions to reveal a very disgruntled face. A pair of sleepy, serpentine eyes took a few moments to adjust to the light suddenly filling the room. Then they focused, settling on an enormous, tartan-beribboned blue box currently clutched between the hands of a visiting angel.

‘What on Earth is _that_?’

‘It’s a gift. No need to open it while I’m here.’

Aziraphale placed the box ceremoniously on the nightstand. Crowley, not entirely in the habit of receiving large and unexpected gifts, stared at it with blank mystification.

‘What, for New Year’s Day?’

‘In a way. It’s a peace offering. That’s why I came round: I’ve resolved to make peace with you today.’

‘I was already at peace. I was asleep.’ Crowley frowned. ‘Hang on, did we have a fight about something? Should I be apologising?’

‘No, no. It’s a _New Year’s Resolution_. Apparently they’re a new human fashion. I thought I had better join in.’

Crowley gawped.

‘Wh… no… Aziraphale, no, they’re not a new fashion. It was all the rage in Babylon.’

‘It _was_? Hmm.’ He looked concerned. ‘Must have passed me by.’

‘I’m shocked. Look, does it involve anything from me? The making peace thing?’

‘Well, I suppose it involves us being kind and forgiving to one another.’

‘So basically the best I can do for you here is go back to sleep?’

Aziraphale gave him a withering look. ‘No, actually, but in the spirit of my promise, I will be understanding and let you rest.’

‘Real milk of bloody human kindness, that is.’ Crowley located one of the larger pillows, and pulled it back over his face. ‘I’ll see you later, then. _Much_ later. Please.’

Mr. Moss was by the door of his shop, hatted and coated, and gazing anxiously down the street. His heart sank when he saw Mr. Fell approaching.

‘Good morning, Mr. Moss!’ said Aziraphale cheerfully, walking straight past him and into the shop.

Determined not to do anything to encourage the man, Mr. Moss took out a large antique watch.

‘My nephew’s late,’ he said, pointedly. ‘I’ll have to close the shop in a moment, or I’ll be late to meet her. Oh, dear. It will be the first New Year’s Day I’ve been late in ten years.’

His customer did not respond to this. He was already closely inspecting one of the new titles that had been placed out on the window display that morning.

‘Oh, I haven’t seen a copy of this one in years. How much were you thinking for it?’

‘Two pounds. Oh _dear_ ,’ Mr. Moss said again, slightly louder and more pointedly. ‘I really will be _late_ to meet _Cecilia_ if I don’t close the shop _._ ’

Mr. Fell was frowning to himself. ‘Some staining on the spine, there, mind you. I wouldn’t have thought it was worth so much as that.’

Mr. Moss cast one last desperate look down the street, but there was no sign of his nephew, who had promised to watch the shop that day. He briefly contemplated simply telling the man to clear off, but was prevented by the knowledge that Mr. Fell was really the only one of his regulars to _always_ have money. And lots of it.

‘Will you,’ he said hopelessly, ‘will you do something for me, and I’ll give you that book for free?’

_That_ got his attention. Mr. Fell straightened up, his eyes gone round.

‘Why, I’d certainly be honoured to help you, Mr. Moss,’ he said, ‘but I can’t imagine _what_ service could possibly – ’

‘Just stay here for five minutes until my brother’s boy comes to watch the shop, would you? He’ll be here in two shakes, but I’m really out of time. All you have to do is tell him I’ve run to meet Cecilia, and if anyone comes into the shop before he arrives, get them to come back later. Can you do that?’

‘But of course! Only I – ’

‘Don’t mention it! Thank you very much!’ Mr. Moss said hastily before he could get another word out, and hurried off down the street.

Aziraphale was left alone.

He spent a few moments indulging in roseate day dreams. The ideal of his dreams – perhaps of every bibliophile’s dreams – was realised. He had a bookshop. He walked round the shop with a spring in his step, pausing to pick up and admire a particularly well-kept volume of the _Encyclopédie_ – with a squashed mosquito on page 234, according to Mr. Moss’s label, left there by Diderot himself in 1766. It was all his – all those rows and rows of glorious Morocco bindings of every size and colour, those lines and lines of gold- and silver-embossed titles. Deliberately he imagined himself as their owner. By the time he had walked round the shop three times he almost believed that he was the owner.

At this point a small boy appeared in the doorway.

‘Hello,’ Aziraphale said suspiciously. ‘What do you want?’

‘Where’s Uncle?’ said the small boy with equal suspicion. ‘Cause our Tom’s ill and can’t come.’

Aziraphale’s demeanour changed.

‘Oh dear!’ he said. ‘Well, that’s quite all right. You must tell him not to worry one bit. Say that a good friend of Mr. Moss’s is here and everything is being taken care of.’

The small boy stood, as though rooted to the spot. Aziraphale went to a cupboard, and under pretence of rummaging through it, clicked his fingers to summon a bag of fresh cherries and a packet of chocolate from the grocer’s next door, at the same time as miracling payment for them into their cashbox. He returned to where the child was standing.

‘Here, take along this fruit for your poor brother, and send him my good wishes for his health. And _here_ is something for you.’ He winked at the boy as he gave him the chocolate, and then made a motion of dismissal with his hand. ‘Now, home you go!’

The boy went home, clutching his spoils.

And – just like that – Aziraphale found himself _truly_ in charge of the bookshop. For the whole day.

He sat down behind the counter, and took a moment to compose himself.

On the other side of some restorative deep breaths, it occurred to him to wonder whether this ‘New Year’s Resolution’ business might be more than a passing fad after all. He was quite aware that there were a number of superstitious human rituals which did, in fact, tap into some form of supernatural energy, and could produce at least subtle effects on reality. Although the humans were absolutely useless, as a rule, at noticing which ones were which.

It has been quite some time since Aziraphale had experienced a stroke of real good fortune, to the tune of ‘getting a free day alone in a bookshop’. Was it possible that, by forming and acting on the resolution, he had activated some kind of ambient power? Perhaps the kind of sedimentary magic built up by years and years of accumulated human belief, or the traces of a very ancient blessing?

He made a mental note to investigate this possibility later, by learning more about these resolutions and their origin. Perhaps he could repeat the experiment next year, and see if it brought him any more bookshops, or otherwise delightful events.

For now, though, he was simply going to enjoy his _own_ spoils.

Angels can read much faster than humans, when they choose. But Aziraphale normally preferred not to. He was opposed to speed-reading a book for much the same reason he was opposed to running through a lovely landscape: it was no kind of way to enjoy the view. (He didn’t know it yet, but he was about to spend two hundred years becoming increasingly affronted by the humans’ single-minded obsession with figuring out how to speed through landscapes faster, and in a greater variety of machines.)

Aziraphale’s preferred pace of reading, however, did also rely on his preferred conditions for reading. Namely: peace, quiet, and – most importantly – _time_. Uninterrupted and unlimited time.

If you’d asked him, Aziraphale could have recited a list of twenty books in Mr. Moss’s shop he wanted to get a look at, without even needing to cross the threshold. (Lucky, then, that you didn’t ask.) Now he had the place to himself for the day, and could personally browse the shelves for items of interest, he identified double that number.

But all he had was one day.

He knew, in his heart of angelic hearts, that he could not read forty books before Mr. Moss came back. Even at his top speed. But he also knew that if he left without glancing over at least a _page_ of every one of those forty books, the thought of the missed opportunity would torture him for several weeks.

It is the job of an angel, of course, to guide and advise humans through the inner turmoil created by a desire for material things. Some angels, on learning that a human feared weeks of pain over an item they had not been able to take home with them from a shop, would reassure them that they could soothe this pain by turning their attention towards higher spiritual matters, perhaps by practising some form of what, by the twenty-first century, would come to be called _mindfulness_.

Aziraphale was not one of those angels.

Having taken the forty books off the shelves, and gathered them together on the countertop which he was temporarily considering his domain, Aziraphale paused. He had been coming to Mr. Moss’s bookshop for some seven or eight years now, and had always been rather impressed by the consistent tidiness of the place. Mr. Moss, he felt, must be a methodical man. Possessed of methods Aziraphale himself lacked entirely, a fact which kept his own lodgings looking a little disorderly to the untrained eye. Now that Aziraphale’s chosen books were colonising the counter in teetering piles, and the neatly-ranged shelves were spotted with conspicuous gaps, the shop did not look _quite_ the same orderly business that its owner had left behind.

It occurred to Aziraphale that this was not entirely in line with his goal of being helpful.

Not to worry, however. The mess was only _temporary_. Aziraphale would have everything put back to rights long before Mr. Moss returned, of course, so it hardly made a difference in the long run.

He sat down to read.

It wasn’t long before he was interrupted by the entrance of a thin lady of uncertain age.

‘Good morning,’ she said icily. ‘Where’s Mr. Moss?’

Aziraphale answered from behind his blockade of books.

‘I can’t hear a word you say,’ she said – more frigidly than ever.

Aziraphale removed four or five books from the right-hand stack, and placed them temporarily on the floor next to him.

‘Mr. Moss has had to rush off on urgent business,’ he explained helpfully, through the gap thus created in the wall of books.

‘Who’s in charge?’

‘It’s just me here, I’m afraid, but I shall endeavour to help you in any way I can.’

She looked at him with distinct disapproval.

‘Well, I’d like to buy that book just there.’

The lady pointed to one of the books he had just relocated carefully to the floor, set aside for his own reading pleasure.

Aziraphale looked down at it.

‘That one will be a pound and two shillings,’ he said firmly.

She gasped.

‘I paid fourteen shillings for the first volume last month.’

‘Oh, then I’m afraid Mr. Moss _rather_ undercharged you,’ said Aziraphale with a wince, adding a hasty, ‘if you’ll excuse me speaking ill of him.’

‘Undercharged – ?’ she repeated indignantly. ‘Are you suggesting that you consider yourself a higher authority on pricing than Mr. Moss?’

‘Well… yes,’ said Aziraphale primly.

‘And how, exactly, did you arrive at that conclusion?’

‘I happen to have more experience of the book trade than he does. If you’ll forgive my immodesty.’

Aziraphale’s manner of fulsome politeness seemed to madden her.

‘More than ten years’ experience trading?’

‘Yes, my dear. More than that.’

She glared at him with vindictive triumph.

‘I happen to have been involved with the London trade all my life, you wicked, lying man, and I know that you have never been a bookseller here.’

Aziraphale met her eye calmly.

‘No, I’ve never been in a position to establish a shop. I trade privately. And usually under a pseudonym. I expect you’ve made purchases from me, without knowing it.’

‘I shall certainly not pay more than fifteen shillings,’ returned his customer severely, laying down this amount on the counter. ‘And I shall complain to Mr. Moss when he returns. It’s scandalous. And a pack of wicked lies!’

‘The price is a pound at the very least,’ Aziraphale insisted. ‘You must understand my position. Mr. Moss is a good friend, and today I am responsible for his livelihood. I couldn’t possibly allow him to lose money.’

Clearly capable of identifying a losing battle when she saw one, the thin lady picked her shillings back up while she still had some dignity left to preserve, and turned for the door.

‘I shall certainly be informing Mr. Moss about this incident,’ she insisted angrily as she left the shop. ‘You wicked, avaricious man!’

Aziraphale tutted disapprovingly at her tone, then went to close the door behind her.

Satisfied, he went back to his reading.

He had only managed to skim through two more books when a sudden quiver in the air drew his attention to the arrival of someone not-so-human on the street outside. This gave him a moment of apprehension, which turned into relief when the doorway was darkened not by an angelic presence, but a familiar demonic one.

Crowley took in the sight of his co-conspirator, barricaded behind the counter by books.

‘Aziraphale,’ he said suspiciously. ‘What are you doing in here?’

‘I could ask you the same question.’

‘No, you could not. Firstly, because I have much more business browsing a shop than you have working in one. Secondly, because I came here specifically to find you. Followed your aura. So, answer the question. Why the sudden moonlighting?’

Aziraphale marked his place regretfully, and put down the book in his hands.

‘I object to the idea that I have no business working in a shop,’ he said, taking off his spectacles.

‘Why? Heaven not paying you these days?’

‘Not in spending money, no, and they never have. But that’s rather beside the point. I’ll have you know I’m performing my duties.’

Crowley looked pointedly over the stacks of books in front of the angel.

‘Yes. I can see you’ve got quite a lot of duties to be getting on with, there.’

It is a great gift to be able to lie so as to convince other people. It is a still greater gift to be able to lie so as to convince oneself. Aziraphale was, occasionally, possessed of the latter gift.

He drew himself upright.

‘The proprietor of this establishment was called away on an urgent personal matter. And the young man who had promised to watch the place for him has been taken ill. Left unattended, the premises would have been at risk, and Mr. Moss would have lost a day’s takings. I simply stepped into the breach. On one of my days off, no less.’

‘Takings, eh? How much have you taken so far, then? Made a killing for good old Mr. Moss, have you?’

Aziraphale was quiet for a moment.

‘Well, you can’t expect me to turn into a salesman all of a sudden. It’s not quite in my nature to be mercenary.’

‘No,’ agreed Crowley, grinning. ‘No, I should say it’s not. I could always give you a little demonic hand, I s’pose. Stick around for the day. Hawk books to passers-by.’

The angel had to admit this sounded tempting. But he could socialise with Crowley later that evening, or tomorrow. The books on the counter, he could only read today.

‘It’s a very kind offer. But I couldn’t possibly keep you.’

‘You could.’ The demon’s expression turned serious all of a sudden, as he remembered what he’d come in for. ‘Aziraphale. You _definitely_ could.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You bought me two Wedgwood plant pots.’

Aziraphale beamed.

‘Oh, good. You liked them.’

‘Liked them? _Liked_ them? _Angel_!’

‘What?’

‘I’m saying, I owe you more than a piffling half-day helping run a smelly old bookshop, is all.’

‘That’s absurd, Crowley. You don’t owe me a thing. It was a gift.’

Crowley shook his head.

‘Fated cosmic adversaries do _not_ buy one another gifts, Aziraphale.’

‘They do if one of them has taken a New Year’s Resolution to treat the other well.’ Something occurred to Aziraphale then, and his face lit up. ‘There! See? I’ve been repaid already. Look how well my New Year has begun.’

He waved a hand around them, at the bookshop.

Crowley looked at the place, which did very much seem like Aziraphale’s personal idea of Heaven, and had to concede the argument with a shrug.

‘As a matter of fact,’ the angel went on, ‘if you _really_ want to repay me, you’ll let me give you something else. Keep the Resolution going. Increase my karma.’

‘Are you turning into a Buddhist?’ enquired Crowley, but Aziraphale was already walking away from him, with that preternatural speed he was capable of when he forgot himself.

‘Here,’ said a voice from around the corner of a bookcase. ‘I saw this and thought of you earlier.’

‘I don’t want a book,’ Crowley called back stubbornly.

‘Not even this one?’

Aziraphale reappeared, and held something out. Crowley inspected it. It was a first-edition copy of Copernicus’s _De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium_ , in nearly mint condition.

‘Ngh…’ he said.

‘Yes, that’s what I thought.’

‘You do know you can’t gift me _other people’s property_ , right?’

‘And I’d never dream of such a thing. Here.’ Aziraphale swiftly used a miracle to fetch money from the coffer in his lodgings, opened Mr. Moss’s till, and deposited an appropriate sum. He closed the till decisively, and enjoyed the sound of it _ding_ -ing for the first time that day. ‘You have your book, Mr. Moss has his takings, and I have a satisfied conscience. No need for debt of any kind. That’s how good deeds _work_ , dear boy.’

Crowley looked down at the valuable tome in his hands.

‘Gosh,’ he said. ‘I wish _you’d_ been running Heaven when I worked there.’


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content note: multiple angelic eyes.

After Crowley had gone on his way, Aziraphale settled back down to his reading.

He was not, however, destined to beat his winning streak of two books in a row. By the time he had raced through one book, and started to tackle another, he had become embroiled in battle against another bitter adversary – and not the kind of adversary who could be easily dispatched with a hint of charm. No, the adversary he now faced was an impassive creature, a thing beyond reason. It was Mr. Moss’s antique grandfather clock.

Aziraphale did not usually have trouble filtering out small, unwanted noises. (He would find himself having _terrible_ trouble with it when the humans took to wearing AirPods on the bus, but that wasn’t going to happen for some time yet.) If anything, under usual circumstances, he would find the gentle sound of a ticking grandfather clock to be pleasingly atmospheric. But in his tense frame of mind, as he hurried to get through his reading, the steady mechanical rhythm was impossibly distracting.

He had half a mind to stop the pendulum with a miracle. But Aziraphale had bad form with clocks. Clocks manipulated by a miracle, he had learned, tended to develop more of an independent free spirit than a clock really ought to have. His own pocket-watch had a deplorable habit of trying to improve its owner’s punctuality, by speeding itself up at the most inopportune moments. Aziraphale could not count the number of times he had made a flustered apology to Crowley for his tardiness, having abandoned an important task unfinished, only to find out he was actually ten minutes early for their meeting. (It had not yet occurred to Aziraphale that the miracle causing his watch to do this might be more demonic than angelic.)

He could, of course, try to stop the clock manually. But Aziraphale did not spend a great deal of time taking care of clocks the human way, and he hardly trusted himself to interfere with this one.

Eventually, he decided he would simply pick the clock up and carry it to the back of the shop, where it would be out of earshot. However, he had not counted on the clock being quite as aged and decrepit as it was. Of course the angel made sure to get a good grip on the base of the wooden casing, and lifted the thing up smoothly and securely, but the second the clock tipped forward even slightly in his arms, the glass covering the clockface fell right off and smashed into pieces on the bookshop floor. It was quickly followed by the pendulum, and several miscellaneous pieces of clockwork, which came tumbling through the door in the casing without warning, and left it swinging pathetically on its hinges.

Aziraphale put the clock back down very quickly. He stared guiltily down at the mess of glass and clockwork on the floor of the shop.

Then he noticed the total, blissful absence of the sound of the pendulum.

It would, of course, be a simple matter for him to put everything back where it had been, using a miracle. Most likely, Aziraphale would leave the grandfather clock in better shape than he had found it. The process would take less than a second.

There was, therefore, no pressing reason to repair it _now_. Mr. Moss was not due back for hours yet. Aziraphale could miracle the clock back into shape ten minutes before the proprietor arrived, and he would never be any the wiser.

He left the bits of broken clock on the floor, and sat back down to read.

*

‘Well, well, well. What have we here?’

Aziraphale looked up from his book.

Two demons were lurking in the doorway of Mr. Moss’s shop. Not the suave-and-debonair kind. The kind that looked like they might not spend very much time above ground. Aziraphale supposed they must have noticed the presence of his own angelic aura, combined with the lingering scent of Crowley’s visit earlier in the day. He had to admit the mixture would probably be attention-grabbing, if you happened to be a pair of demons passing by.

There was a taller, androgynous one, sleek and refined in appearance except for a thoroughly inhuman protrusion on their forehead, who carried no animal sigil but put Aziraphale distinctly in mind of a cassowary bird. And there was a shorter one, rather masculine, stocky and shifty. That one was dressed like a blacksmith’s apprentice about to get roundly told off for poor personal hygiene, not least because of the pigeon perched on his shoulder.

 _Aha_ , thought Aziraphale. _Birds of a feather, is it?_

All three beings eyeballed each other.

This was the point at which Aziraphale was supposed to say: _Begone, foul fiends_ , or _Out, you wicked devils_ , or _I’m terribly sorry, but I’m afraid you’re not welcome here_.

He didn’t.

His mind had gone straight to his New Year’s Resolution. Aziraphale had sworn to make peace with his enemy, just for the day – and in the process of doing so had, quite possibly, invoked an unknown and ancient force. Since keeping the Resolution seemed to have brought such happy consequences as this day of reading – what was the likelihood that breaking it would cause trouble?

He stared at the demons.

The demons stared at him.

Aziraphale smiled.

‘Good afternoon,’ he said. ‘Do come in. How may I help you?’

The two demons exchanged glances, obviously not prepared for the encounter to go off-script quite as soon as this. Moving as one, they took three nervous steps forward.

‘What d’you mean, _help_ us?’ asked the pigeon-demon.

‘He hasn’t noticed we’re demons,’ said the cassowary-demon, revealing that the first, rasping voice had been theirs. They glared at Aziraphale with round, orange eyes and repeated, more emphatically: ‘We’re _demons_.’

‘And I’m an angel, yes. I _had_ noticed,’ he replied mildly. ‘But that’s no reason for me to prevent you looking at a few books. Should you so wish.’

There was a pause.

‘Yes it is,’ said the cassowary-demon.

‘Why?’

There was a longer pause.

‘We might make trouble,’ they said.

‘But you might not,’ Aziraphale countered.

He tried his best to make this sound like an instruction, rather than a suggestion.

The two demons exchanged glances again.

‘We’re demons,’ said the taller one, stubbornly. ‘It’s our job to make trouble.’

‘What’s an angel doing in a shop like this, anyway?’ demanded the other. ‘Where’s all the humans?’

‘I’m running it,’ said Aziraphale. ‘As a favour to a friend.’

‘Like Hell you are,’ snorted the pigeon. ‘Angels don’t run shops.’

‘Or have friends,’ added the cassowary.

‘Well, this one does.’

The pigeon-demon grabbed his companion abruptly by the sleeve, and dragged them around the corner of a bookcase. There, they conferred in low tones, as if in the sincere belief that the angel could not hear them from his position a few feet away.

‘This one’s funny. I say we leave.’

‘Really? You seen him?’ said the rasping voice. ‘He’s _soft._ He’s just trying to avoid a fight, cause he knows he’ll lose it.’

‘Have _you_ ever won a fight with a principality?’ asked the pigeon-demon urgently.

‘No, but imagine the clout downstairs if we did, Pidge. Two of us. One of him.’

‘I don’t need clout,’ Pidge grumbled. ‘I need a day off.’

‘Same thing, innit? Come on, let’s test the waters. Push him a bit. See what happens.’

Behind the counter, Aziraphale straightened his bow-tie.

The two demons emerged shiftily from behind the bookcase.

‘Okay,’ said the taller demon. ‘We want to, er. Look at a book.’

It was now four o’clock. (Not that a visitor to the shop would have been able to tell you this, unless they were lucky enough to have their own timepiece.)

‘Certainly,’ said Aziraphale, in his best dealing-with-humans voice. ‘Did you have a particular book in mind? Or perhaps you were hoping I could make some suggestions?’

‘An expensive book,’ replied the cassowary. ‘Whatever book here the humans think is most – most – special and valuable and not-allowed-to-be-touched.’

Aziraphale sucked air in through his teeth, and reminded himself that he was being _polite._

‘Unfortunately, I think only the owner himself could give you permission to view the rarer antiques. But you’re bound to find _something_ of interest, out here on the shelves. Perhaps you’re not sure what you would like? No need to be shy. I’d be delighted to advise you.’

‘What we would _like_?’ The cassowary sauntered over to the nearest shelf, and dragged a clawlike finger across the spines of the books. It left the faintest of scratchmarks in the leather. (Aziraphale would remember this moment, unexpectedly, when some rapscallion had the temerity to key the paintwork on Crowley’s Bentley more than a century later.) ‘We wouldn’t _like_ any of them. Stupid human material _stuff_. We don’t like books.’

‘Like them or not, I must ask you _not_ to touch them in that manner.’

This was an error. The demon took on a gleeful look.

‘Oh, you mean in _this_ manner?’

Cass (Aziraphale, very abruptly, found himself assigning the demon an undignified nickname) drew that sharp fingernail across the next row of books. Emboldened, Pidge giggled, and followed suit –

‘Gentlemen. I really must ask you to stop, or I shall be forced to – to – ’ Aziraphale recalled his Resolution. _Peace, old boy_ , he reminded himself, although his teeth were gritted as he did so. ‘Or I really shall not be pleased,’ he finished, decisively.

‘Shall you not?’ leered Cass.

This was no good. A distraction was needed.

‘The fact of the matter is, you really can’t declare you don’t like books unless you’ve tried to read one. _Have_ you tried to read one?’

There was a pause. Pidge was the first to break it.

‘No,’ he confessed.

Cass looked at him, furiously.

‘Well then,’ said Aziraphale, just a little smug. ‘You simply must read something before you go. I insist.’ An idea came to him, and he rose from his seat, shuffling his way out from behind the counter. ‘Do you know, I might suggest the Marquis de Sade. Certainly an interesting figure in _your_ line of work. I’d perhaps start you off with a _very_ short story about a monk – ’

‘What the Heaven would we want with a story about a monk?’ interrupted Cass.

‘He’s not a very well-behaved monk,’ answered Aziraphale evenly, as he pulled a slim volume down from a shelf.

The cassowary-demon was rolling their eyes, but Pidge cut him off by asking:

‘How badly behaved?’

‘ _Very_ ,’ said Aziraphale, and held the book out.

The pigeon went ahead and reached for it, but his friend knocked the hand out of the way before it could make contact with the book.

‘Don’t you dare,’ said the cassowary sternly. ‘We _do not_ read books.’

‘Not even books about sinful monks? Recommended by _angels_? You must be a bit curious.’

Cass paused, with the expression of one who has just discovered how it feels to experience temptation, and doesn’t like it. Then they recollected themselves.

‘Probably lying,’ they sniffed. ‘Probably, the monk’s a goodie-two-shoes. Like _him_.’

They turned and snatched the book from Aziraphale’s hands. Aziraphale said:

‘Er – ’

‘He’s probably stalling,’ went on the cassowary, and fanned the pages open. ‘Probably buying time until help comes. Back-up angels. Probably _scared_. Cause he knows he can’t do anything to stop me doing _this_ – ’

Cass raised the book aloft and proceeded to feign ripping it, twisting the edge of a single page with a faint degree of torsion that might – conceivably – have torn one or two molecules of paper asunder.

The shop went dark.

*

The average architect, having been briefed to design a building for a bookshop, might reasonably expect the premises to need to accommodate a variety of things.

Typically, these would include the following:

  * Display tables
  * Shop counter
  * Bookshelves
  * A large number of books
  * A small number of customers
  * A bookseller
  * An umbrella stand.



(Some would argue that the umbrella stand is optional; those people are not booksellers, and have not had to reckon with the very tangible threat posed by unsightly drops of rainwater across their bookshop floors.)

A particularly thorough architect – or, perhaps, a particularly anxiety-prone one – might additionally picture his bookshop-to-be accommodating the following things, and design it accordingly:

  * Robbers, thieves, and bandits
  * Drunken revellers, wishing to amuse themselves by playing merry havoc with the books
  * Rampaging fire.



Shortly after the events of the tale at hand, a specific architect, briefed to design a specific bookshop, will be given a very specific list of things to consider in its design. It will contain things that absolutely no human could anticipate needing to consider when designing a bookshop; nevertheless, it will not be the sort of list an architect can safely ignore. That list will contain the following:

  * A very large wine cellar
  * A discreet side door, ideal for surreptitious visitors who might need to exit post-haste
  * Suitable hiding places for books that must remain hidden, for example false-backed bookcases.



There is one thing, however, that even this most exotic of lists will fail to mention (although this may indicate a lack of foresight on the part of the list-writer.) The fact of the matter is that no architect, planner, or construction worker – no matter how gifted in matters of the imagination – has ever prepared a bookshop to bear up well under the manifestation of an angel’s metaphysical form.

*

The bookshop remained in pitch blackness for several seconds before anything happened.

 _GENTLEMEN,_ said a disembodied voice that rumbled like thunder.

Then everything erupted into searing white light. The whole shop was thrown into relief, revealing that the two demons were now clutching one another in a way that was, it must be said, not especially demonic.

The light seemed to have its origin at just the spot where Aziraphale, moments ago, had been standing. If you squinted into the centre of the sunburst, it was just possible to make out a suspicion of something feathery; and then feathers began to unfurl in earnest, one after another. Without warning, the two demons found themselves awestruck before the entire display: the flashing golden rings, the six swan-wings spinning like a demented carousel. Celestial winds swept through bookshop. The earth shook with divine wroth. Thousands upon thousands of eyes stared at the demons, and they _really were not pleased_.

Everything was plunged into blackness again, as the angel flipped the switch on the divine high-beam and activated the emergency lighting instead. All over the terrifying, unearthly form, neon blues and yellows began to vibrate in the darkness.

‘Crikey!’ squeaked Pidge.

There was a _pop_ of demonic magic, although which one of the pair had produced it was anyone’s guess. In a single seismic shift of soil and floorboards, the earth opened up, and received the two demons once more unto its embrace.

*

As soon as the intruders had descended safely into Hell, the bookshop became lighter. Harried passers-by could once again be seen outside the bookshop windows, in the drab London sunshine, as if nothing at all had happened. Behind the counter, a perfectly human-looking middle-aged gentleman cleared his throat sheepishly, checked his pocketwatch, and began to conduct a nervous body pat-down.

But the unfortunate truth is that, no matter how much havoc a pair of miscreant demons might be capable of wreaking upon an unsuspecting bookshop, calling up celestial winds and shaking the earth with your divine wroth also rarely turns out to be forgiving on the furniture. After reassuring himself that his clothing was still intact, it began to dawn on Aziraphale that he had made quite a mess. Some might say, more of a mess than the demons would have made without intervention; but Aziraphale rapidly found a way to convince himself otherwise. _He_ , at least hadn’t damaged any actual books in the process. Moreover, unlike the demons, he had not only the capacity but the absolute intention of miracling everything in the shop quite back to rights before its owner could –

‘Oh,’ said a voice behind him.

Aziraphale turned. In the doorway, Mr. Moss was standing still, and looking round with an air of bewilderment.

‘Where’s Bill?’ he said.

‘He couldn’t come,’ said Aziraphale. ‘I mean to say, he was taken ill unexpectedly, and his brother came to tell you, but I was here instead, as we’d agreed. I thought I had better stay and watch the place myself. You know, in case of troublemakers.’

He looked round the rifled shop, taking in the ruined grandfather clock, the toppled books, the débris that is always and everywhere the inevitable result of a battle. Then he looked at Mr. Moss, waiting for the bewilderment on his face to change into horror and fury. He simply continued to look baffled.

‘I did manage to sell a book,’ Aziraphale went on soothingly, and tapped on the till where his takings could be found. ‘Only the one, but you’ll be pleased to know I proved myself _quite_ the stickler on price.’

He braced himself for the delayed reaction.

Mr. Moss broke into an enormous smile.

‘Thanks, Mr. Fell,’ he said almost humbly. ‘Mr. Fell, she’s taken me. She’s going to marry me. Isn’t it grand? After all these years!’

‘I’m afraid there’s a bit of a mess,’ said Aziraphale, returning to the more important matter. ‘A pair of troublemakers came in, and I – ’

‘Troublemakers?’ the bookseller echoed. ‘Oh dear. And you so kind as to watch over the shop. You must be terribly shaken, Mr. Fell. They didn’t hurt you, did they?’

Aziraphale blinked.

‘Oh. Er. No. And I saw to it that they didn’t get their hands on any books. But you will find a few things out of place, so to speak.’

‘That’s all right, Mr. Fell. That’s quite all right. What a shock you must have had from those hooligans, a shy gentleman like you… Now, I promised you that book, didn’t I?’ Mr. Moss picked up the faintly-stained volume that Aziraphale had been admiring that morning. Then he paused, his gaze lingering on the stacks of books occupying the counter. ‘In fact, why don’t you take a few?’

‘I…’ The angel tried not to splutter. ‘But – my dear fellow, the _mess_ – ’

Mr. Moss waved aside his apologies.

‘It doesn’t matter, Mr. Fell,’ he said. ‘Nothing matters today. She’s taken me at last. I’m going to shut shop for the rest of the afternoon and go over to her again.’

Aziraphale considered continuing to insist that he was undeserving of free books. He didn’t consider it for very long.

‘Well… If you insist…’

‘I do, Mr. Fell. As many books as you like, go on, help yourself. Thanks for staying.’

‘Not at all. Don’t mention it,’ said Aziraphale nobly. Then, ‘I think I’ve had enough of that New Year’s Resolution lark. Keeping the peace with my enemies, and all that. You’re quite sure one day will be enough for this year?’

‘Er – yes. Well, I’ll shut up. Don’t you stay, Mr. Fell. You’ll want to be getting on with your day, I’m sure.’

*

Aziraphale’s enemy was much more prepared to receive him that evening than he had been in the morning. After receiving Aziraphale’s second New Year’s gift, Crowley had headed to his favourite food market, to source a few choice macarons and some white tea leaves with which to repay his friend’s generosity. These were now laid out very presentably on the table in his sitting room. Crowley was also extremely keen to hear all about the rest of Aziraphale’s day, having (correctly) guessed that . Aziraphale was keen to tell the tale, too. Only, he had some rather more pressing business on his mind first.

‘You see,’ he explained to Crowley earnestly, ‘ _Dear_ Mr. Moss let me have a few books in return for watching over the shop, only I’ve quite run out of suitable furniture at home, and I am so loath to leave any of them on the floor – the mice really do run riot in those rooms. But I couldn’t help noticing this morning that you had some free space on that handsome old bookcase of yours, and, well… I don’t suppose you could be a dear and…?’

He patted on the leather bag with a smile, eyes darting hopefully from his enemy to his enemy’s empty shelf.

‘Angel,’ groaned Crowley. ‘You have _got_ to find somewhere to keep all your books.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The sculpture here is roughly 30" across and a little less high (75cm). It's done in papermache.
> 
> The sculpture now lives full time in a bookstore in Connecticut where it terrifies customers.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for stopping by!
> 
> Come back next week to find out what happens when some up-to-no-good demons arrive at Mr. Moss's shop - and to see some MAGNIFICENT true-form sculpture art...


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